Safety device for repeating firearms.



J. H. WHEELER.

SAFETY DEVICE FOR REPEATING FIREARMS.

APPLICATION FILED NOV. s, 1913.

1,088,950. Patented Mar. 3, 1914.

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COLUMBIA PLANOGRAPH cu.. WASHINGTON, D. c.

J. H. WHEELER.

SAFETY DEVICE FOR REPEATING FIREARMS.

APPLICATION FILED NOV. 3, 1913.

Patented Mar. 3, 1914.

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JOHN H. \VI-IEELER, OF NEW HAVEN, CONNECTICUT, ASSIGNOR TO THE MARLIN FIREARMS COMPANY, OF NEW HAVEN, CONNECTICUT, A CORPORATION OF CON- NECTICUT.

SAFETY DEVICE FOR REPEATING FIREARMS.

Specification'of Letters Patent.

Patented Mar. 3, 1914.

Application filed November 3, 1913. Serial No. 798,804.

To all whom it may concern Be it known that I, JOHN H. -WHEELER, a citizen of the United States, residing at New Haven, New Haven county, State of Connecticut, have invented certain new and useful Improvements in Safety Devices for Repeating Firearms, of which the following is a full, clear, and exact description.

My invention relates to certain improvements in a repeating firearm of the type set forth in Hepburn Patent No. 943,828, dated December 21, 1909.

In the accompanying drawings Figure 1 is a side elevation of the breech of a firearm closed and locked ready for firing, the barrel and magazine portion and part of the stock being removed. Fig. 2 is a side elevation of the same parts as shown in Fig. 1 in a different position, the side plate of the receiver being removed. Fig. 3 is a side elevation of the breech-block and locking bolt. Fig. 4c is a view of the opposite side of said breech-block and locking bolt. Fig. 5 is a plan view, partly in section, of the loekingbolt, the same view also showing a plan view of the upper part of the hammer. Fig. 6 is a view of the inner side of a side plate carried by the breechblock. Figs. 7 to 9 illustrate details of construction. 7 A detailed description of the operation of the breech mechanism is unnecessary in the presentcase, as the same is fully set forth in the aforesaid patent. In the present case, therefore, it will be sufficient to describe in a general way only the operation of said parts, the detailed description being confined to those features of improvement which are made the subject-matter of the present improvement.

In the drawings, 1 represents a recelver having a removable side plate 2. The gun is of the side ejector type having an opening through the side plate 2, which open ing is filled by the forward end of the breech-block and hinge plate 3 when the gun is locked up ready for firing, as shown in Fig. 1. The breech-block 4c is provided with the usual extractor and ejector mechanism.

5 is the locking bolt which is pivoted to the block 4. The top wall of the receiver 1 is provided with a notch which furnishes a lock-up shoulder, as indicated in dotted lines at 6. The locking bolt 5 is arranged to swing up into this notch and against the lock-up shoulder when the gun is ready to be fired. The plate 2 is provided on its inner s de with a ledge 7 as indicated in dotted lines, Fig. 1. The plate 3 is pivoted at 8 and its rear end is arranged to rest on and follow the curve of the ledge 7 as the breech-block is reciprocated, the said plate 3 moving back inside of the receiver when the gun is open so that said plate will stand in the position indicated in Fig. 2. The plate 3 is provided on its inner side with a supporting shoulder or ledge 9 which is designed to co-act with my improved safety device.

The firearm herein described is of the pump action type, and has its breech mechanism operated by the usual reciprocating action rod which enters the receiver at its forward end, as indicated in dotted lines, the outer part of the action rod having the usual handle (not shown) which is grasped by the hand of the user in taking aim and in operating the breech mechanism as occasion requires. I11 the use of pump action firearms, the tendency of the user is to pull back on the action rod handle when aiming the gun and in holding the stock of the gun against the shoulder, This pulling back on the handle has a tendency to unlock the gun which must be guarded against until after the cartridge is discharged, for otherwise there would be danger of blow-back in the event the cartridge hangs fire. In the former patent above referred to, there is a friction safety device comprising a lateral offset arranged to rest upon the ledge 9 and be frictionally engaged therewith until released by the recoil of the gun, the release being effected wholly by spring action. In some instances it may be found that spring action alone is insufficient to guarantee the certain release of the safety device, and the present invention, therefore, aims to provide an improvement in this feature of construction whereby the release of the safety latch is guaranteed as soon as the gun has been discharged. This releasing action in the present case is guaranteed by supplementing a spring releasing means with an inertia controlled knock-oif device, the details of which I will now describe.

Referring particularly to Fig. 5, it will be seen that the friction locking device comprises a safety latch 10 pivoted in a groove in the side of the locking bolt 5 adjacent the plate 3. Thi lever has a lateral offset 12, which, when the gun is locked up, as shown in Fig. 1, rests upon the ledge 9 and consequently any tendency to swing down the locking bolt from the locked-up position will be prevented. The lever 10 is provided on its inner side with an arm 13 against which may bear a spring 14, the opposite end of which spring bears against a hammer-controlled slide 15. The hammercontrolled slide has a cam surface 16 which is arranged to coact with a corresponding cam surface 17 on the safety latch 10. The

spring 14 tends to force the slide 15 rearwardly so that the cam surfaces 16 and 17 will engage and thereby force outwardly the shoulder 12 to the position indicated in Figs. 1, 4 and 5. When the hammer, indicated conventionally at 18, descends to hit the firing pin 19, it will strike the slide 15, forcing it ahead so as to move the shoulder 16 away from the cam shoulder 17, putting the spring 14 under more tension so as to tend to cause the lever 10 to tilt in a direction to withdraw the shoulder 12 from engagement with the ledge 9. hen the recoil occurs, the pull of the operators hand upon the action rod handle will be momentarily released so that the frictional binding engagement of the under side of the shoulder 12 on the ledge 9 will be released so that in turn the spring 14 will tend to tilt the lever 10 and withdraw the shoulder 12 from the ledge, whereupon the action rod may be retracted to unlock the gun by movement of the locking bolt 5 down from engagement with the lock-up shoulder in the upper part of the receiver. If by chance the spring 14 is insufficient to guarantee this swinging of the lever 10 with certainty under all conditions, a supplemental inertia piece coacts with the lever 10 to assist the action of the spring 14 and to guarantee the certain retraction of the shoulder 12 under all conditions. This inertia piece is indicated at 20 and is pivoted in the side of the locking bolt 5, the pivot point 20 being at one side of the center of the mass of said inertia piece. This inertia piece is provided with an arm- 21 which engages an arm 22 on the forward part of the lever 10. The bulk of the weight, or mass, of the inertia piece is so arranged relatively to the pivot point 20 that the recoil of the gun will cause the inertia piece 20 to swing in a direction to cause the arm 21 thereof to engage the arm 22 of the lever 10 and apply pressure thereto in a direction to augment the pressure of the spring 14 so as to withdraw the shoulder 12 from the ledge 9. It is well known that in some instances cartridges hang fire and during that period it is obviously important that the locking bolt should remain in the locking position to guarantee against a dangerous blow-back. The operator, by his involuntary act of pulling back upon the action rod handle and steadying the gun while aiming the same, furnishes the power neces sary to cause the shoulder 12 to frictionally bind 011 the ledge 9 during the aforesaid interval, even though the slide 15 is advanced. lVhen the shell explodes, however,

7 the recoil action of the gun causes the aforesaid momentary partial or complete release of the binding pressure between the parts 12 and 9, at which moment the spring 14 and the inertia piece 20 cooperate in moving the lever 10 to the position wherein the shoulder 12 is moved back from the ledge 9. The hammer 18 remains in the forward position, holding the slide 15 advanced until the hammer is again cocked, which, in this particular instance, is effected only by the retraction of the breech mechanism.

The retraction of the breech mechanism first requires the throwing down of the bolt 5 from the locking position. This throwing down of the bolt 5 causes the now retracted shoulder 12 of the safety lever 10 to move down in front of the face of the offset part forming the ledge 9. Hence while the breech mechanism is being reciprocated to extract and eject the empty shell and to insert another cartridge, the safety lever 10 will be held in its ineffective position. When, however, a new cartridge is fully inserted and the gun is again locked up, the parts will resume the position indicated in Fig. 1, the shoulder 12 being forced out onto the ledge 9 by the action of the spring 14 and the inclines l6 and 17 on the parts 15 and 10 respectively, thus making it impossible to unintentionally unlock the gun until the gun has been fired. As in the former patent, means is, of course, provided to permit the manual release of the locking bolt, even though the gun is loaded and cooked, without allowing the hammer to descend, the means in the present case corresponding substantially to the means described in the former patent to the extent that it includes the manually operable finger-piece 51, the inner end of which is arranged to engage the slide 15 independently of the hammer and push it ahead, whereupon the lever 10 will at once swing into position to withdraw the safety shoulder 12 from the ledge 9, thereby permitting the breech mechanism to be opened. A shown in the drawings, the finger-piece 51 is exposed at its rear end the forward slide engaging end being indicated in dotted outline in Fig. 1.

The particular form of the finger operating release 51 is immaterial. So also the particular form of the spring in the inertia piece for operating the safety latch 10 may be modified, the important thing being to provided these coacting means which supplement each other in the automatic control of the afety latch when shifting it from the locking to the unlocking position.

What I claim is:

1. In a repeating firearm, a receiver, breech mechanism therein including a locking bolt movable into and out of a locking position, a manually controllable operating device cooperating with the locking bolt to move the same, a safety device for holding the locking bolt in the locking position until released, said safety device comprising a movable locking shoulder carried by the locking bolt and a relatively stationary shoulder carried by an adjacent part and arranged in the path of movement of said shoulder to block the same when the locking bolt is in the locked position, means for automatically releasing the locking bolt upon the recoil of the firearm, said means comprising a spring coacting with said safety device, and a movable inertia piece also coacting with said safety device, said spring and lnertia piece operating to shift the shoulder on the safety device to the position where it is free of the said adjacent cooperating shoulder.

2. In a repeating firearm, a receiver, breech mechanism therein including a looking bolt movable into and out of a locking position, a manually controllable operating device cooperating with the locking bolt to move the same, a safety device for holding the locking bolt in the locking position until released, said safety device comprising a movable locking shoulder carried by the locking bolt and a relatively stationary shouldei carried by an adjacent part and arranged in the path of movement of said shoulder to block the same when the locking bolt is in the locked position, means for automatically releasing the locking bolt upon the recoil of the firearm, said means comprising a spring coacting with said safety device, and a movable inertia piece also coacting with said safety device, said spring and inertia piece operating to shift the shoulder on the safety device to the position where it is free of the said adjacent cooperating shoulder, said locking bolt and both of said shoulders being arranged to reciprocate together, said cooperating shoulder standing over said safety locking shoulder to hold the same retracted excepting when the locking bolt is in the breech locking position.

3. In a repeating firearm, a recoil operating locking device comprising a locking arm, a relatively stationary locking shoulder, means for forcing the former into locking position relatively to the latter, a manually operable operating device coacting with said locking arm whereby pressure on said operating device in a direction to unlock the locking arm Will hold saidshoulders in frictional engagement until the recoil of the gun, with means for then automatically withdrawing said locking arm from looking engagement with the relatively stationary shoulder, said means comprising a spring and an inertia-controlled piece. 7

4c. In a repeating firearm, a recoil operating locking device comprising a locking arm, a relatively stationary locking shoulder, means for forcing the former into locking position relatively to the latter, a manually operable operating device coacting with said locking arm whereby pressure on said operating device in a direction to unlock the locking arm will hold said shoulders in frictional engagement until the recoil of the gun, with means for then automatically withdrawing said locking arm from locking engagement with the relatively stationary shoulder, said means comprising a spring and an inertia-controlled piece, and a locklng bolt, said locking arm, spring and inertia piece being carried thereby.

5. In a repeating firearm, reciprocating breech mechanism including a tilting looking bolt arranged to also reciprocate with said breech mechanism, a locking arm pivot- Vally mounted in the locking bolt having a locking shoulder with means arranged to force said shoulder outwardly when the breech mechanism is closed and locked and the hammer is cooked, a relatively stationary shoulder cooperating with the locking shoulder to block the unlocking movement of the locking bolt before the firearm is dis charged, said means comprising a recipro eating slide with an inclined connection between said slide and said locking arm, with means for automatically casting off said locking shoulder upon the recoil of the firearm, said means comprising a spring and an inertia-controlled block, said hammer coacting with said reciprocating slide to release said locking arm to permit said shoulder to be automatically retracted after the hammer has dropped and the firearm has been discharged.

JOHN H. WHEELER. Witnesses:

JOHN F. MORAN, CLIFFORD H. SEYMOUR.

{topics of this patent may be obtained for five cents each, by addressing the Commissioner of Patente,

Washington, D. G. 

